It has become more and more common to have a computer based home entertainment system, integrating a computer with other home entertainment products such as a VCR, audio devices, computer peripherals, and the like. Integrated personal computer and television systems are known in the art as a “convergence environment” in which a personal computer (PC) is integrated with other devices and capabilities, such as and usually including at least television (TV) capability. Such hardware components are known and available in the art. An example is the Gateway Destination PC/TV system, available from Gateway, Inc., known as the Gateway Destination System.
Peripheral computer devices attached to a computer may include, for example, and not by way of limitation, a mouse or other pointing device, printers, scanners, modems, keyboards, joysticks and game pads, and virtual reality devices such as gloves and visors. These devices are typically physically connected to the computer central processing unit (CPU) box via cables and the like. As such, mobility and range of the devices is somewhat limited. Although longer cables may be attached to the devices, for each device attached, a cord is used.
Many peripheral devices such as keyboards, mice, joysticks and the like have recently been equipped with wireless communication links to the main computer. Such wireless links include radio frequency (RF) links and infrared (IR) links. Other links may be viable, such as optical and the like. However, due to the movement nature of many such peripherals, a wireless link is often difficult to maintain, since movement may interrupt the wireless link, especially in the case of an infrared link.
Still, peripheral devices to date only communicate via one way communication. For example, a signal is transmitted from a peripheral such as a keyboard to a host such as a PC with no interaction back to the keyboard. Present technology uses one way communications and simply assumes that the communications channel is functioning and that the data typed into the keyboard is received by the PC. No feedback is given to the user when the communications link is broken.
An IR protocol called TWIRP has been developed by SolutionNet which allows two way IR communication. Some wireless keyboard manufacturers have added this protocol to some versions of their keyboards. No known RF keyboards currently use two way communication.
If communication is lost, the only way to find out is to look at the screen and see that there is an error in the connection. This is not fast enough, and often there are too many errors and the catch up time is beyond the capacity of the peripheral. The peripheral may have a small buffer and the number of characters or signals exceeds buffer size. This causes frustration of the user if characters or signals are dropped due to an unstable communications link.